Heat forward LeBron James has been robbed of an MVP during a statistically superior season in the past. / Steve Mitchell, USA TODAY Sports

by Ian Levy, USA TODAY Sports

by Ian Levy, USA TODAY Sports

This year's NBA MVP Award probably will go to someone other than LeBron James.

That is not because his regular season performance will be anything but utter domination, and it is not because the Miami Heat are poised for an organizational implosion. It's because this year he doesn't have the most important criterion on his side.

Research at Hickory-High.com last season showed that about 51% of the variation in MVP voting could be explained by the statistical performance of players in categories like points per game, shooting percentages and team win percentage. That means that the other 49% of voting is driven by the context of each player's statistics, largely including how compelling players' story lines are. What that means in predicting an MVP is statistics don't take you the entire way; they give a pool of likely candidates.

From there, narrative takes over and ultimately makes the decision.

The last two seasons the numbers were strongly in James' favor. Whether favoriting deep statistical versatility stretched across points, rebounds, assists and shooting percentages or the comfort of a single metric such as player efficiency rating or win shares, almost any list of MVP candidates placed James at the very top. But that wasn't what won him the award.

It was stepping over a crushing NBA Finals loss and redefining himself as the embodiment of offensive and defensive versatility. It was making the Heat his own and setting the standard for a new era of lineup creativity. It was winning 27 games in a row and shaking off the ghosts of his struggles in clutch moments. Of all the possibilities, James had the best story to go along with the best numbers.

But this season it's tough to see how he can make that narrative case. The Heat appear to have lost none of their potency, but there has been a notable decline in mystery and intrigue. They have answered all the most compelling questions and all that is left is wondering when their dominance ends. James could certainly top Chris Paul, Kevin Durant or Paul George in individual statistical brilliance. But he doesn't appear to have any MVP aces up his sleeve. He's not going to be putting the finishing touches on an organizational transformation from laughingstock to title contender or returning a team to brilliance after a devastating injury to himself or a teammate.

Unfortunately this year he's faced with the curse of success: All he can do is the same things he has done before. That makes his brilliance inherently less interesting and, unfortunately, interesting is what gets recognized.

If James doesn't win the MVP this season, despite a dominating statistical performance, it wouldn't be the first time that he was conquered by a more compelling story. The research from last year also gave a formula for projecting what share of the possible MVP votes each player should have received, if statistics were the only criteria.

In 2010-11, James' stat line - 26.7 points, 7.5 rebounds and 7.0 assists a game on 51.0% shooting for a team that won more than 70% of its games - should have earned him about 47% of the maximum possible vote total according to that statistics-only formula. That should have been enough to top both Derrick Rose and Dwight Howard, who would have been projected to receive 39% and 27% of the maximum possible vote total based on their stats.

But Rose's ascension and Howard's defensive dominance were much more positive narratives than James arriving in Miami to lead an apparent super-team after having trampled the hearts of Cleveland Cavaliers fans on national television. James had become a villain, and the stats were close enough for the voters to feel justified in giving the award to the hero of a story.

James is not the only player who has lost out on an MVP award in this way. Results show that on the back of stats alone Dirk Nowitzki should be a three-time MVP, holding not just the the one he was actually awarded in 2007 but also the two that went to Steve Nash. And if statistics were the only measure, then Kobe Bryant's lone MVP would belong to Paul.

But that's not to say that these MVP awards were given to the wrong players. The criteria by which this award is to be decided have been left specifically vague by the league, giving each voter the freedom to make their decision on whatever grounds they see fit. Reasonable people can disagree on the relative importance of points per game and the narrative of a player single-handedly transforming the future of their team. The interweaving of both sorts of evaluation is what makes the MVP results so fascinating every year and why watching to see what happens to James this season should be such an enormous thread to follow.